Life Luggage
by Cassop
Summary: Horatia Evans thought she was the bastard daughter of a teenage mother. She was a well-kept embarrassment. So how was she to know she'd been born Harriet Potter, and that the wizarding world toasted her existence? A well-used plot-line for your enjoyment. (You're welcome.) Runic magic, the supernatural, magical politics, and a richly developed wizarding society. Not a romance.


_Disclaimer: _I disclaim. (The following to be sung to the tune of 'knick knack paddy whack':)

I'm not her,  
He's not mine,  
this sit-u-a-tion makes me whine

Et cetera.

Because writing songs was never my forte. Here, for your delight, is yet another overused plot-line! Yes, you're welcome.

Enjoy. It may take a different form to what you may be used to. (I ruddy well hope so anyway.)

* * *

_Prologue_

Petunia Dursley had taken one look at the tousled toddler on the doorstep and made that sour face which Horrie would later say looked like she'd smelled something nasty. She would come to know it very well, because Aunt Petunia always wore it when she looked at her niece.

As though Horrie were something to be scraped off her entirely sensible shoes from Barratts.

The woman read the letter _that headmaster _had left, of course. And she had decided, then and there, that no child with a name as common as _Harry_ could be allowed to live under her roof. And so Harriet became Horatia. Distinguished. If Petunia couldn't give the child over to the nuns, then she would train her to be a good, well-behaved girl. A credit to them, as long as they could squeeze the unnaturalness out of her.

Only, Horrie was not a pretty child. She was all awkward angles, knobbly knees and elbows and stick-thin limbs. There was a pinched look to her pointed little face, a sort of perpetual hunger in the large green eyes.

"She's never been a well-favoured thing," Petunia would say, casting a pitying look at the child if anyone mentioned how ugly she was. And no one pointed out that she might have been slightly better-looking, if someone had actually fed her. Her clothes fit, but they were stuffy things that were better suited to an age gone by - strict pinafores and and thick knobbly cardigans. Woollen tights with sensible, chunky shoes that looked slightly ridiculous at the end of such thin legs.

Because in Aunt Petunia's opinion, "girls did _not_ wear trousers."

Aunt Petunia had a _lot _of opinions, Horrie thought. She couldn't wear glasses, because "girls who wear spectacles _do not_ attract men to marry." And if there were one thing Petunia had set her heart on, it was that Horrie would no longer be the concern of good, decent people the moment she turned eighteen.

Vernon had made some noise about 'not making room for the freak', but the minute he had made hopeful glances towards the cupboard under the stairs, Petunia had stood firm. "Girls do _not _sleep in cupboards, Vernon." The thought of her Dudley having to make room occurred to her, and the sour look returned. "She can sleep on a mattress in the utility room down here, under the boiler. It can be put to the side during the day. I'll teach her. She'll learn to keep things tidy."

So Horrie cooked. She learned to clean. She learned to make her movements quiet and to be invisible. She existed, but as though she were a mere piece of furniture. An extension of the house.

And she squirrelled scraps of paper, of _words, _into her clothes so that she could devour them alone, blinking and squinting in the dim light that filtered through the door from the hall, which her Aunt and Uncle kept on at night so poor Dudders wouldn't be afraid if he had to make himself a midnight snack.

And she read and read and read. And escaped.

Until the day that the Letter came. It was thick and heavy and beautiful. The child's eyes were big as they looked at it, scanning the addressee. _H. Potter. _Not a name she was familiar with. There were only the Dursleys, and then there was her. But it was strangely addressed -

_Miss H. Potter  
Under the Boiler  
Privet Drive_

_etc._

It couldn't hurt to take it, and then to pretend it had come in the post tomorrow. She could already imagine the confused look she would wear in the morning. Horrie tucked it efficiently into the waistband of her skirt, along the seam, so no edges showed, and then collected the rest of the post.

She didn't say anything as she handed the two letters to her uncle. Horrie hated speaking, not if it wasn't necessary. She sat back in her seat, unconsciously assuming an erect posture, and keeping her elbows off the table. Aunt Petunia was quick to punish for bad table manners, and even quicker to slap her hand. It didn't sting (much), but she was hardly a toddler.

Not that Dudley's manners were _ever _criticised.

It wasn't until after school that she had time to fish the letter out. Aunt Petunia picked Dudley up as usual, bundling him into the car and driving away. As usual, Horrie walked. She enjoyed it, though. School was horrible. Everyone called her 'Horrible Horrie', and if Dudley and his friends were feeling particularly nasty they mocked her speech, drawing out the syllables and making her sound stupid.

"Does H-H-Horrible Hoooorrrie have nothing to say?" they would grin, cocking their heads to one side and laughing at their own cleverness.

Comebacks never sounded clever if they took an age to come out, so Horrie's quick mind formulated vicious rejoinders that would have shocked her teachers. They were brutal and coarse and _rude, _and it made her feel that much better to know that she was cleverer than they were.

That they were nothing.

She had realised there was no way to reseal the envelope if she broke the wax seal on the back, and wasn't planning on letting her aunt and uncle discover its existence at all. It was her secret. So she opened it.

_Dear Miss Potter,_

_We are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Please find enclosed a list of all necessary books and equipment._

_Term begins on September 1st. We await your owl by no later than July 31st. Should you not have access to the wizarding postal service, our muggle postal address is enclosed for your convenience. Either method must see your response delivered to us by no later than July 31st._

_Yours sincerely,_

_Severus Snape  
Hogwarts Secretary  
Head of Slytherin House_

It went even so far as to list the equipment required on the second page.

She goggled. Etiquette forgotten, she gaped at the practical joke in her hands. Magic wasn't real. Whoever this H. Potter was, she would have been in for a treat. It looked like real parchment and a _quill _of all things had been used. The ink was bottle green, her favourite colour. And it was true cursive, like the librarian used.

Special.

She squinted at the 'muggle' address, whatever that was. As she didn't have access to an owl, there was no chance of continuing the joke or allowing the prankster to know it had been appreciated.

Although… it wouldn't be too hard to pilfer a stamp and some writing paper from Aunt Petunia's desk. She wouldn't use that floral stuff, just the plain set that Uncle Vernon used sometimes if he had a business letter to write. It was even watermarked – not as nice as _this_, but it would do.

That night saw her crack the door open to let the light in so she could see better. She squatted in the shadows by the door and began writing. She hadn't dared take her Aunt's fountain pen, so was using a pencil stub.

_Dear sir,_

_I'm afraid no one called H. Potter lives here. It's just Aunt Petunia and Uncle Vernon and Dudley and me. I didn't show your letter to them because I don't think they would understand the joke. I liked it though. It made me laugh._

_I'm sorry I opened a letter that wasn't for me. I thought you might like to know that someone laughed at it though. You went to a lot of trouble and it wasn't wasted. Did you really use a quill?_

_Yours sincerely,_

_Horatia Evans  
Ten years and three quarters_

She looked over it critically. She didn't have any fancy-sounding titles to put after her name, so she'd put how old she was so he wouldn't think she was just some little kid messing around. She was proud of how she sounded. Pretty fluent for a girl who struggled to string two words together.

Horrie licked the stamp, affixed it to the envelope, and carefully copied out the address provided, trying her very best to make it look like the beautiful cursive on the front of the original Letter.

That went into the rip in the bottom of the mattress. She had to squash it a bit, which was sad, but she couldn't carry it around forever. Aunt Petunia might find it. She had put it mildly, saying that they wouldn't understand. They would go ballistic. For some reason, ever since she could remember, Uncle Vernon went puce and Aunt Petunia pale at the word 'magic'. And they had made it clear – very, very clear – that there was _no such thing._

Horrie snuggled into bed, not noticing the lumps in her mattress for once, nor the fact that despite being July, it was unseasonably cold. She wriggled in excitement, glorying in the feeling of having her very own secret, and knowing that as she _always _picked up the post, it was very unlikely she would be found out if Mr Snape replied. Whoever he was.

She was in for a rather large surprise.

* * *

_I don't want to just repeat the first book verbatim simply making allowances for Harry being a girl instead of a boy, so there will be some major and minor differences in her first year of school at Hogwarts. Hope you enjoy them. I also didn't think it was entirely unreasonable that a woman who gave a poor child the appellation 'Dudley' Dursley wouldn't be cruel or pretentious enough to call a girl 'Horatia'. As to why Horrie bears her mum's maiden name and other things will be addressed next chapter._

_Assuming you want another chapter. :P _

_Cassop_


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